BSST 2013-06-01
Did something go wrong in the production of Book Two: Spirits? News recap included! As we are now nearing one full year since the last new episode of The Legend of Korra aired, it is certainly frustrating the fandom as the days move onward without any real indication about when the next book will begin - we've seen tweets and Tumblr posts from voice actors prompting excitement, only to disappear and ultimately prove to be wrong. So, it makes us wonder - why is Book Two taking so long to premiere? As of this writing, to be specific, it has been 11 months and 8 days since the Book One finale - this is now longer than any hiatus between episodes of ATLA. So, why the long holdup? What exactly has happened? In my opinion - there are two plausible theories: * Something went technically wrong in production. * Bryke made a change or changes in the Book Two story line. On theory #1: Technical fault Any device is plausible to have a breakdown. Putting the drawings into animation, voice recordings, anything could have glitched in the middle of putting together the episodes. As a result, it could force the staff to re-shoot, re-make, etc. any of the scenes in any episode - and pending on where the breakdown happened, it could be a lot of hard work to put a potentially broken scene back together. However, I think this theory is not plausible. I would be led to believe that if there were a breakdown in the production process, Bryan K - being a leader in putting out little LoK easter eggs via Tumblr - would probably have said there was something gone awry during this work. Instead, we have gotten nothing but updates speaking of progress on the animation work for Book Two. Now let's see - "A" not being true does not necessarily mean "B" is true. But is "B" more plausible? On theory #2: In-book story line change(s) The way I see it, this could be a more plausible theory given the holdup we are experiencing, and also the general hush-hush from Nickelodeon, Bryke, and the rest of the staff. What needs to be kept in mind is that Book One ended on a rather poorly-executed note; rushed with everything just kind of thrown together with no real explanation - how did Korra airbend exactly? What of the Equalists post-Amonatak1? Makorra just suddenly getting together with some dry "I love you too"? Aang giving Korra her bending back for free? Bryke could very well be taking a look at some of the mistakes they made in Book One, and as a result, are taking their time more with Book Two. As a result, they may very well be double-checking the produced work for Book Two - there's a good chance, then, they found something within the story line they don't like. The changing of one scene can also result in changing elements around that scene - build-up and aftermath. This would cause a rewrite, revoicing, reanimating, etc. As a result, these little changes could also be holding up the release while Bryke works to perfect everything. So yes, we certainly cannot assume anything about the production - only the LoK staff and Nickelodeon have the answers about when the release date will be (something more specific than "later this year", in other words). But I digress. In case you've missed any of it - here are some news bits that have broken between BSST issues: * LoK news updates: ** Book 2 enters a "spotting session" (4/23) ** Nick upfront confirmed a Book 2 release date for somewhere in 2013. (5/7) ** Preview pages for LoK Art of the Animated Series, Book One. (5/10) ** Grey DeLisle posted on Tumblr about a potential release date for LoK while Avatar's music creators, The Track Team, informed us of something exciting coming. (5/17) ** Book 3 storyboard image (5/17) * We got previews of TSPt2 pages, a cover of TSPt3 and a release date: ** First preview page of TSPt2 and TSPt3 cover (4/8) ** Seven additional TSPt2 preview pages (5/1) ** Release date for TSPt3 (5/17; same blog as Book 3 post above) Thank you to everyone who has helped collect pieces of news over the past couple of months - and stay tuned to the latest blogs from our Associate Contributors - including myself (lol, shameless self-promo ^^") - for the latest Avatar related developments! But if you are the first here to see news yourself, do not be afraid to make a blog post and report it! I leave you with the signoff made famous by late CBS Evening News anchor Walter Cronkite: And that's the way it is, Ba Sing Se Times Issue 56, June 1, 2013.